


Turn Back Time

by Ralcemns



Category: The Scarlet Ibis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2016-09-07
Packaged: 2018-08-13 12:26:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7976746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ralcemns/pseuds/Ralcemns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not often that you get the chance to go back and fix the fatal mistake that's been eating at you ever since you made it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Turn Back Time

**Author's Note:**

> I was feeling major secondhand-guilt after reading The Scarlet Ibis, so I felt the urge to make this sequel
> 
> Yes, that is Twenty-One Pilots there at the beginning

* * *

 

_"Sometimes a certain smell will take me back to when I was young_

_How come I'm never able to identify where it's coming from?_

_I'd make a candle out of it if I ever found it_

_Try to sell it, never sell out of it_

_I'd probably only sell one_

_It'd be to my brother, because we have the same nose, same clothes, homegrown, the stones thrown from the creek we used to roam_

_But it would remind us of when nothing really mattered..._

_... Wish we could turn back time..."_

* * *

 

"... Well that's the answer to your question. That's what's got me 'looking all down', as you phrased it," Jacob concluded.

The old woman nodded, finishing the refreshment that'd been her entire reason for stopping at the house. "Guilt is such a terrible thing."

Jacob only hummed in reply. He didn't want to break down in front of a woman he didn't even know. She'd only been a weary traveler passing by, after all.

"If you had the chance to change what you'd done, would you take it?" the woman asked.

"I'd take that chance faster than I could think about it," Jacob answered. "Anything to at least be able to simply apologize to Doodle... That would be something."

"Here's something, then," the woman said, throwing something onto Jacob's lap. He picked it up and turning it over, observing it. It seemed to be an ordinary blue stone on a string.

"Hold that in your hand tightly and imagine the time and place," the woman instructed, leaving without another word of explanation.

Jacob's nerves jounced. "Wait... wait!" he called after the old woman, but she was long gone, which was odd, since she seemed as slow as any other senior citizen when she'd come by the house.

Jacob examined the stone again. He knew he'd feel like a fool if he tried what the woman had said, but it would be only to himself. Despite his parents' hounding, he was still single, and had no family home.

 _Imagine the time and place_ , he repeated in his mind. With a shuddered sigh, he shut his eyes, clutched the stone tightly, and imagined.

Suddenly there wasn't a chair beneath him anymore, and he fell on his rear. Ironically he didn't feel like a fool because he was sitting next to the blood tree, a tree that wouldn't be there in the time he'd been in.

The winds picked up, and the infamous storm he'd only just finished talking about commenced.

"Brother, brother, don't leave me!" the painstakingly nostalgic cry of Doodle rang out. Jacob quickly looked towards the source, seeing his younger self dash past. He wanted to give him a swift kick in the teeth, but the crack of tree bark distracted the older Jacob.

"Doodle! Doodle!" Jacob called out. Doodle didn't respond, and he hoped it was because he simply didn't recognize his voice.

"Doodle!" Jacob sighed in relief when he saw the tiny, trembling form of his little brother.

Doodle looked up at him in confusion. "... Brother?" He really must not have grown out of his looks from his youth.

"Yes, yes, it's me, it's alright now," Jacob assured him. "I'm so, so sorry. I'll not leave you again, I won't!" He scooped up the small boy, tears coming to his own eyes faster than he could dismiss them.

 _Now what?_ he pondered. Should he take Doodle back to the house in this time, orー

As soon as Jacob thought of the time and place he'd come from, he popped back in it. Doodle was still in his arms.

"Brother, what happened?" Doodle questioned, twisting get his head all around to gaze at the changed scenery. It was contrastingly sunny and peaceful compared to the storm they'd just been in.

Jacob fumbled for an answer. He thought of going back and returning Doodle to the right time, but with the stone held tightly in hand, nothing happened.

"What... I think it only works twice, for there and back," Jacob mused aloud.

"What works? What happened?" Doodle persisted.

"Maybe if you try..." Jacob guessed. "Here, hold this tightly, and imagine being in your bedroom."

Doodle took the stone and did as he was told. Nothing happened.

"Why are you bigger?" Doodle asked. "What happened?"

Sighed for the third time that dayーor, rather not, his second sigh being in another time. "Doodle... you understand time, don't you?" The small boy's head dipped. "Well, think about years, and how long those are. I brought you to a place where many of them have gone by. I'm bigger because I'm older."

Whether or not Doodle understood, Jacob couldn't tell. "Where's Mama and Daddy?"

"Mama and Daddy..." Did he dare call them and shock them with the sight of their long dead son?

Jacob wondered briefly if it was like those time travel stories where a character changes something in the past and alters their original time. So far, everything seemed the same as he'd left it.

"Let's go inside," Jacob decided, keeping his hold on his little brother while he walked up to and through the door. Then he carried him not to Doodle's old bedroom, which was empty, but to his own bedroom. There was his bed in there which he told Doodle he could rest on.

As Jacob made his way to the phone, he muddled through all that just happened. It seemed so surreal, like a dream, and the amazementーor shockーhadn't settled in yet.

Tentitively he spun the wheel that dialed the numbers to the seniors' home, asking to speak with either one of his parents. He resisted the urge to slam the phone back onto the reciever and avoid the call entirely.

"Jacob?" eventually came from the other end. It was his father.

"Dad," Jacob responded. "Something... insane just happened."

"What? You finally got a girlfriend?" his dad joked.

"What? No, no!" Jacob denied. "This isn't the time for jokes. Something really, truly, crazy impossible had happened."

There was a long pause. "... Which was?" his dad prompted.

"Oh, right, it's, ah... you won't believe me over the phone," Jacob explained. "You'll have to see for yourself."

"Us? Come over? Or just me?" his dad asked.

"Oh, uh, both of you, definitely... Maybe I should tell you now, to at least mentally prepare you so you don't faint, and then you can come over," Jacob suggested.

"It sounds like the dead've been raised, the way you're talking," his dad jibed.

"... Not quite," Jacob admitted.

"What? What are you saying?" his dad questioned.

"Okay, just listen to me, and you have to promise to come over and see for yourselves before your dismiss my claim!" Jacob insisted.

"Just spit it out, Jake," his dad demanded.

"I went back in time and brought Doodle to the present," Jacob said all at once. He waited for a reply with bated breath, but only heard the familiar click of the opposite end hanging up.


End file.
